I got a text from a friend the other day. Oddly enough, this text was regarding another friend ..."I sure admire her for asking for help when she needs it." Those words screamed out at me. They echoed in my head like a stone dropped into an empty well.
For a very long time I have lived in and amongst many natural disasters. There have been so many times when the world surrounding me has been so dark that I fought with everything in me to shred just the tiniest hole so that some sunlight could peak in. My emotions have been rocked so hard that I can't even remember what normal is anymore. The whole while I accepted so many acts of kindness and gifts of love but when asked "what can I do to help?" All I could think of was ... "Make it all better."
I know my pain shows on the outside. People comment about how they can tell when I am upset. Some have even been as bold to say ... "I miss you!" Of course me being a people pleaser, phrases like this make me feel even more helpless. Every ounce of my being has been soaked up in caring for my family and now I have to be extra careful of what I say, my facial expressions and my outward appearance. I don't even know anymore how many times I have dealt with utter chaos only moments before an event where I have had to pick myself up, dust myself off, wipe away the tears and put a smile on my face. "It's show time!"
The truth is ... I have been grieving for years now. I won't get into detail of all of my losses but I will tell you that you don't know grief until you have walked in the shadows of it. It doesn't always have to be a loss of life either. Grief can also be felt with the loss of a job, a great friend moving away, losing a life long habit etc. etc.
Obviously my main grief has been the loss of my mom, even before she passed away and directly after, the loss of my dad. He has not passed away but to watch him ache with emotional pain and deal with physical sickness I feel that I started to lose him the day I lost my sweet mother.
Unfortunately its not over. I want it to be over. You have NO IDEA how much I want it to be over. I took a lot of loss before I finally felt like my emotional strength just couldn't keep up. Often people have wondered why I take all this on. Some have even commented about how "others don't take care of their parents like I do." What can I say? My heart is a compassionate one. I have always empathized as a child with people who were sick or hurting. I ache to help them. Perhaps some day when I am in need of care someone will care for me the way that I have cared for others
Right now my heart aches for my dad. He lays in his bed 24 hours a day. Not watching t.v, not sitting up, just lying there. I wonder what he thinks about. I know he prays to go to his heavenly home to be with his honey. How long does he have to wait till God answers his prayers? How long do I have to endure this pain before his prayers are answered? I shouldn't complain though. He totally and completely believes that he is pain free. Its not even like he isn't telling me because he wants to be brave either. Today I felt my patience slipping ... "Get up, you know you can. Why don't you?" No matter how much I beg or bribe he just won't budge. This is not the dad that I knew. He is in there somewhere but I think the better part of him left a long time ago.
No one can help me the way that I need help right now. No once can tell me how long this will go on for. No one can tell me when this grievance will end. My Job right now is to pick myself up, dust myself off, wipe my tears, put a smile of my face and care for/sit with the man who has been my father, the strongest man I know. He held my hand when I was little, he carried me when I was sick, he called me his treasure. I will treasure this man until his prayers are answered and forever more.
Some day the darkness will be gone and the sunshine will be strong and steady. I relish in that someday.
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